Make Your Own Coffee

Damon Darlin gives More Advice Graduates Don't Want to Hear in the New York Times.

1. Save 10% of your income before anything else
2. Learn to cook
3. Never borrow money to pay for a depreciating asset
4, Cut out the lattes.  Make your own coffee.
5.  Find your mate, marry and stay married.
6. Never pay a real estate agent a 6% commission
7. Buy used things
8. Enroll in a 401(k) at work
9 Resist the lunacy of buying premium products
10 Postpone buying hi-tech products

If you can't used to living on less, you won't need so much for retirement.  If you're a new graduate, and can save $50/week, he says, "You're nearly set for life."

The power of compound interest is magnified the earlier you start saving    If 22-year-old Jack puts $2000 away each year in an IRA for six years and, after six years, never makes another contribution, he'll have as much money for retirement as Jill who saved nothing for the first six  then saves $2000 each year for the next 34.